It started with stomach pain

Kathey Dailey went to a Charlotte emergency room in 2023 for stomach pain. By six that evening an oncologist was standing at her bed with a diagnosis.

“I'm sorry to let you know you have cancer, and I just started crying”

Then doctors pushed for a mammogram

The uterine cancer diagnosis came first. Her doctors urged her to get screened for breast cancer too, something she had never done in 59 years.

“I was 59 years old and had never had a mammogram”

Two days later, a second call

The mammogram came back positive. Dailey is now in treatment for stage four metastatic breast cancer, found only because someone insisted she get checked.

“Two days later, the phone call came, and it said, 'you have breast cancer'”

No insurance, no problem

Dailey was self-employed and uninsured. Project Pink covered the cost, a partnership between Levine Cancer Institute and Charlotte Radiology that brings free mobile mammograms to uninsured women.

Screening is only half of it

Dr. Rhea Rogers says the mammogram works best paired with regular self-exams. One catches what the other misses.

“Self-breast examination in conjunction with mammograms is going to give you your best shot at picking up something”

Ask what help exists

Rogers points women worried about cost toward low-price clinics and hospital radiology departments, many of which quote cash discounts for direct-pay patients.

“I would look at all of your resources available to you”